After three weeks of tedious negotiating and redlining, I finally was able to sign the lease this week. Coolness! Look out, there's 3,705 square feet of arcade awesomeness coming your way.

In May I had a truck do a run across the Northwest stopping in six cities to pickup seventeen arcades (we're up to 72 arcades and 3 pins so far with more lined up). One of the games was a Mr. Do which was in a horrific homemade cab. I was pleasantly surprised when two week's later an empty Universal cab showed up for $15 on Craigslist about 15 minutes from my house. But, with three storage units, my garage and my living room filled with arcades, the cab had just been riding around in my truck for a couple of weeks.

So... the Universal cab was the first item to be moved into the space. Note the green wall at left and the wall with the door at right... those walls are coming down which will leave a large open space:

Later the same afternoon North American Van Lines (NAVL) showed up with a few more goodies. Thanks to Michelle at NAVL or STI or wherever she is... she made it super easy:

I actually leased two adjoining spaces so I decided to punch a passageway through the wall. The demo crew doesn't start until Monday and I just didn't want to wait. And hey, how often do you get to axe through a wall anyway.

The finished product.

And from the other side.

Again, the yellow wall with the door will come down.

And this is the space on the other side of the wall I punched through.

And here's some pics of the games dropped off by NAVL.

A friend offered to drive from the Bay area to Boise with this haul. Yesterday evening he showed up with Frogger, Phoenix, 4 player Destruction Derby and a Galaga cabinet.

Today in the arcade we pulled ceiling tiles and removed ductwork.

Free ceiling tiles anyone???

We also doubled the size of the access between the adjoining spaces. The balloon hanging from the top is so we remember not to kill ourselves on the exposed metal 2x6.

Mid afternoon the next day my friend from the Bay area came back with a second haul from a storage unit he had here locally with Boot Hill, Super Hang On and Gunfight. Here's everything delivered in the past 24 hours:

On Monday we removed most of the ceiling tiles... yesterday we started to remove the drop frame that held the tiles leaving the full exposed ceiling.

We also punched out more of the wall to allow enough space to move games around.

There are two bathrooms in the middle of the space... and they've got to go.

We moved the games that were already on site over to the section that has the full exposed ceiling so the same work can now be completed elsewhere.

Yesterday's progress, more destruction! Continued removal of hanging ceiling frame and metal 2x4s from the interior walls.

Removal of the previous back office area.

Nate shown here fixing the Zaxxon. I played my first game of Zaxxon in over 20 years yesterday. So awesome!!! I remember playing this game at Malibu Grand Prix in Northridge, California.

First draft of the plans came in this morning.

And here is the list of revisions and the mockup I forwarded back to the architect.
-- office wall adjusted to parallel
-- office door moved to south
-- north east vestibule walls adjusted
-- kitchen and bar made smaller
-- flipped bar access
-- relocated kitchen door
-- added wall between kitchen/bar and restrooms
-- made women's restroom smaller
-- moved men's restroom door
-- rearranged interior of men's room, added urinals

And here they are side by side.

NAVL delivered the Pole Position cockpit yesterday. It came all the way from Florida.

Also picked up a Gottlieb Roller Coaster pin yesterday off of Craigslist. I like this game because of this excerpt from ipdb.org: "The kick-out holes send the ball over 'roller coaster' tracks to the flipper inlanes. These tracks were an interesting early omen of the habitrails of modern solid state games."

We also demo'd the green room.

And we punched out two walls creating a second pass through between the two spaces.

On Monday July 2nd we moved all the arcades from my house and from storage to the arcade. I hired a local crew off of craigslist to help with the task. Here the truck has arrived FULL from front to back with arcades.

And how about this... while they were unloading the first load, NAVL showed up with the Guantlet which came from St Augustine, Florida. Notice both trucks in the photo... there is nothing cooler than TWO trucks delivering arcade games at the same time. : )

Pics of all the games we currently have together for the first time. They are temporarily positioned for maintenence and repairs. That's Rob on the ladder putting up the temporary lights. He's doing the demolition work and will be helping me run construction. Thanks Rob!

We also unpacked all our parts and supplies and set up temporary shelving and the work area (will post pics of this tomorrow). In the boxes of CPs that we bought, I found this cool hand made CP that someone built at some point. I don't know why, but I find this very cool. Going to leave this as is and maybe hang it in the bar.

Here's a few pics of the current repair area.

Wow. Everything is crazy busy. Making great progress, but every day is filled. Architects, central district health, kitchen planners, contractors, city permits... the list goes on... but we're having fun and getting closer.

We have a close-to-final version of the kitchen, bar and restrooms.

The current question is should we flip the location of (26) Mug froster and (22) Beer cooler/taps or leave as-is?

Ode to Home Depot

oh Home Depot, how I hate thee
you sell me paint to black out a ceiling
and when I return for more, I come to find
that the paint has been discontinued
no more paint available, you have failed me
ten hours in, twenty gallons on
15% of the job complete
the prospect of starting over burns
phone the manager, bring in an empty
call the manufacturer, "we will run a batch for you"
all is well, painting can resume
you sucked at first and cost me some time
but thank you home depot, for fixing what would have otherwise been a serious uberfail

All interior walls removed. Drop cloth separating arcades from the first half of the paint area

Coming soon on brown paper at the rear entrance

Ten millionth load of debris ready to haul to the dump

Super Cobra side looking along the drop cloth wall

Info sheets available on the door

First Grinkers flyer

My son Sam helping unstick the old glued down carpet

Tile removal

Cleaning up the mess

Sam setup this "vote for your favorite logo" on the outside door. The post it reads "If we run out of slots that you like..." and then I think he got pulled away to another more exciting adventure...

... like maybe this

Drop ceiling has been removed

Tarp being installed to to separate paint area from work area

Ceiling after

Another view

Messy messy... thanks Rob!

War zone

Walking across the arcade the other day I found this smiliey face on the ground... I think this is a good sign. : )

Rob working on running the electical conduit from the mech room to the arcade. On this day we also had our telephone and DirecTV lines installed.

Hello pretty insert coin here plastic thingees that I don't know the name of... welcome to the arcade!

My friend from Spokane came down to deliver a few games. Here's some pics he took during his visit.

We originally leased 3,705 square feet. Later we leased the adjacent 1,056 square feet. Now we have a total of 4,761 square feet. This photo is of the adjacent space. Initially we will be using the sum of this 1,056 square feet as a work / inoperable games storage area. Later, the portion of this space shown in the photo will become an expansion of the arcade. The blue tape rectangles on the wall are us testing television sizes.

My kids helping out with a paint test for some accent colors.

All of the exterior windows have been sheetrocked over. There will be no exterior/natural light intrusion into the arcade. Here the ladder is holding up the center piece until the adhesive dries.

Lighting test for bulb color selection

Drop cloth separator removed... note the black ceiling at foreground and original ceiling at background. Games all have to be moved to the other side so we can paint the other half

Testing the High Score "evidence" we're going to post on our website Grinkers.com next to the players name (you'll be famous!). Yes, we're actually going to have staff document all high scores in this way.

Games moved to the other side of the arcade

Hello pretty arcade games

Games that need love lined up waiting their turn

Some games remaining on the other side covered and wrapped for ceiling painting

Nate working on making the games happy

Construction management aka The Desk of Infinite Cash Expenditures

When my buddy from Spokane and his wife initially visited from Spokane I learned that she is a Empire Strikes Back world record contender... only problem, our ESB is a VectorLabs conversion which doesn't qualify for valid world record scores. So... we picked up this original factory ESB on ebay. Better tell your wife to practice!! And also, we got those jumpers setup right on the Lunar Lander. You'll both have "work" to do on your next visit. : )

Cool note from the ESB seller.

Playing cockpit Pole Position the other day and the game froze on this screen. Added to the fix list.

Pinball stuck after dropping down the circular ramp on our restored Pinbot. Might just be a leveling issue. We shall see. Added to the fix list.

More games pending fixing and restoration

Some game pics

Dave arrives after another 11 hour drive from the Bay area.

Rampage, Major Havoc and more.

Higher angle shots of some of the games lined up where they stand for now.

We setup some games for passers by to play.

Couple kids came by and dropped about $20 into the games.

My son Sam busting out a game of Rampage.

ArcRevival and Hatrick working on the Demolition Derby.

ArcRevival working his magic.

Ceiling painted on the other side.

There should be a museum in New York or London or somewhere for arcade side-art. The National Museum of Arcade Side Art. NMASA.

The arcade will have the two spots on the lower right. (AA Logos, Jamaca Tan)

Dropped off the Demolition Derby to Todd this morning for cabinet restoration. Photo is from the side mirror driving away. I know there are several people interested, so I've asked him to take pics. Thanks Todd!

4" hole drilled through the foundation wall for the kichen's grease trap

"Donut holes" cut out from the foundation wall. Available as souvenirs!!! - $1,000 each or I'll take the Star Wars chair in trade. I'm keeping the Mountain Dew.

Steel stud delivery

Steel studs moved into the arcade

First interior wall goes up

Bathroom area

Kitchen area

The Skynet Funding Bill is passed. The system goes on-line August 4th, 1997. Human decisions are removed from strategic defense. Skynet begins to learn at a geometric rate. It becomes self-aware at 2:14 a.m. Eastern time, August 29th.

Standing in ladies room door, looking down hall towards the arcade

Wide angle shot of the wall work so far

Is it too late to change my mind and call this whole thing off? ; )

Plumbing supplies

Tools of the trade: Cut the concrete. Jackhammer the concrete. Haul the concrete. Rinse and repeat.

Trench for kitchen equipment connections

Trench for kitchen drainage

Left trench for electrical for cocktail arcades in front of the bar. Right trench for bar plumbing.